


In the shadows

by Enchantable



Category: Pacific Rim (2013)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Secret Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-28
Updated: 2013-08-28
Packaged: 2017-12-24 22:31:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,650
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/945407
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Enchantable/pseuds/Enchantable
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There are some parts of their lives they try to keep private.</p>
            </blockquote>





	In the shadows

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt: chuck and mako are secretly seeing each other but have to sneak around in order to hide it from Herc, Raleigh and everyone else in the Shatterdome. Bonus if they have to hide somewhere to have sexy times ;)

"It should be good now," Mako says pushing herself up from under the table. 

Hermann presses a hand to the table and it doesn’t buckle. The scientist gives her a bright grin that wipes decades off his face. Mako can’t help but smile back. Hermann likes to lean against the table, actually he needs to sometimes. And the table rocking or not being level makes that difficult. Mako grabs her tools and drops them back into her bag. 

"Thank you, Miss Mori," the scientist says, "you had better go before my lab partner returns and has you attempt to fix his dissection table."

Mako wrinkles her nose at the thought. She will if he asks, she has before, but she hates talking about the Kaiju. More, she hates smelling them. Mako hands Hermann a roll if duct tape to refresh the line that divides the lab. Down the hall she ticks the item off her list and moves on to the next. 

The Hong Kong Shatterdome runs on a skeletal crew and there are maintenance workers but Mako takes what jobs she can. The people have taken a huge leap of faith, putting their trust in them and she can’t bear the thought of them not having as much of what they need as possible. Gipsy’s being fitted with the latest round of parts, most having to do with her core. Nuclear containment meant Mako was essentially frozen out. 

Adjusting the strap on her bag she heads for the living quarters to fix a leaky faucet before the pilots start to arrive. She takes the stairs, she likes the burn on her muscles more than just walking up and down the halls. She makes her way through to the corridors and pulls open the door to the unlocked room. Or tries to anyway. It’s actually locked. Mako frowns and raps on the door.

"I wouldn’t bother if I were you," someone says behind her, "the two who went in there didn’t look like they were in a listening mood," she can hear the smile before she turns around, "they were complaining about some blue haired girl stealing all their work."

Mako turns and glares. Chuck Hansen’s leaning against the door with a cocky smile on his lips. The kind of smile that only comes when he’s winning and the fact that two techs are doing the nasty in his dad’s room count as a victory. Mako glances down the hall to see that no-one’s there. Her fingers tighten on the clipboard as she stalks over to him. 

"The faucet’s leaking," she says.

"Good thing my old man sleeps like a corpse then," Chuck drawls. 

"That isn’t the—"

his hand closes over her wrist as he yanks her back in to his room and kisses her in one smooth motion. The last words of her sentence are muffled in his mouth as he presses her against the door and slides his tongue in to her mouth. Her clipboard clatters to the ground as she wraps her arms around him and pulls him closer. He’s in civilian clothes and the pale grey t-shirt does nothing to hide his body. She tugs him closer and he makes a low sound before attacking her neck. 

"Quiet," she chokes out, a reminder to herself and to him that they don’t want the base to find out. 

He pushes her harder against the door and she bites her lip to stifle the swear on her to tongue. 

A week and a half later she sits on the scaffold around Gipsy and tries not to cry. 

Her first drift is a disaster and Raleigh’s being nothing but nice which, of course, means Chucks’s being nothing but mean. He always takes things too far and she hates and loves him for it. That’s the problem with both of them, they don’t know when to stop. Their lives have always been about pushing each other, but as she wraps her arms around her knees Mako thinks that if she’s pushed another second she’s going to break. 

She knows she should have listened to Sensei, she wasn’t ready. 

She heads Chuck come up the scaffold and suppresses a moan. She can’t face him after almost blowing up the Shatterdome, not while he’s being such an asshole. He ignores what she wants and drops down next to her. His lips cut and there’s brushing around his eye and high on his cheek. He’s still in his pilot jacket but the armor’s lost some of its shine. She presses her chin to her knee and looks at the techs working on Gipsy instead, telling herself the discomfort radiating off him in waves isn’t enjoyable at all. 

"You shouldn’t be paired with him," he says finally. 

Mako ignores him, biting the inside of her cheek to keep quiet. Chuck hates being ignored. 

"I’m serious," he says, "his heads too fucked up for—"

"Do not speak about Raleigh," she snarls, forgetting her earlier attempt at being quiet, "he is my copilot and your head is just as fucked up," she snaps and turns back to her Jaeger. 

Chuck is silent. 

Mako hates that it’s the most apology she’s going to get from him. 

Cherno and Crimson fall, their pilots drown. Mako’s been a pilot for all of a few days but she’s grown up around them. She’s fixed their faucets and watched their Jaegers come home. Despite Sensei’s words on them not having time to mourn she steals away for five minutes to stand on the Wei triplets makeshift basketball court. She remembers standing there with a print out of the lines and a brush because the maintenance workers had other things to do. It was a miracle it had been dry when they arrived but the looks on their faces made it worth it. 

She stands there for a long moment before going to Striker Eureka’s bay. 

Chuck’s running through some test and Mako’s stomach churns at the nuclear image on the screen. The payload is sandwiched between Striker’s angel wings and Mako wonders if Chuck didn’t design them for this purpose without knowing. She lingers in the doorway, watching for a moment before her fingers itch and she moves forward, picking up the wrench he needs and offering it to him. 

He takes it silently. Chuck’s a solider through and through. Situations like this are what he excels at and Mako wishes she could have his surety. Her legs feel like jello instead and she thinks it might be willpower alone keeping her on her feet. After a moment Chuck bends down a grabs something, handing it to her. 

"Eat it," he grunts out, "it’s the four of us and you can’t pass out in Striker’s cockpit."

She toys with the edge of the bar and he rolls his eyes. 

"It’s chocolate flavored." 

Mako takes a bite and it takes everything in her power not to spit it out. Chocolate is a lose term for the flavor on her tongue. She sees Chuck’s jaw working and realizes she must look truly horrified if he’s about to smile. Forcing herself to swallow she looks at him. 

"That is not Chocolate," she tells him. 

"I said chocolate-flavored," he corrects, "want a lemon one instead?" 

Mako glares because no she does not, she wants to rip her tongue out. But now her prides on the line so she takes another bite. Then another, and another until the bar is gone and she feels marginally better except for the fact that her taste buds want to rebel. Chuck hands her his water bottle and she takes a drink, washing the taste down her throat. 

"Feel better?" He asks and she nods. His eyes darken and he looks at her, "listen what I said before—"

"Dont," she says shaking her head. 

They’re going to die and even though she’s still mad, she can’t bear the thought of them dying with hateful words on their tongue. Or, in Chucks’s case, with apologies that are strange to hear. Chuck looks at her silently and Mako meets his gaze, feeling a heat that’s got nothing to do with her drift suit. 

He slams his hand on Striker’s doors as she drags him away from the view of the feed. 

Their drive suits clink against each other as they pull closer, hands scrambling over plates to find the softer circuitry underneath. Her armor’s shiny and new, his is well worn, tried and tested from a life lived on a battlefield. Irrationally she wishes they were out of them, that there was time to drill them out so they could say goodbye properly but there isn’t. There’s just this stolen moment in the blind spot of the camera as he pushes her up against Striker’s walk and kisses her senseless. 

And just like that its over. 

They close the breach, Striker blows the payload and Mako thinks her heart’s gone with it. It’s gone, they’re gone and Raleigh can hear all the screams that get caught in her throat. There isn’t anything to bury. They memorialize them all the same. First Pentecost who should be with Luna. Then Chuck who Herc places near his mum. She looks down at the headstone and tries very hard not to cry. It wouldn’t make sense to anyone except Raleigh who is sworn to secrecy. 

Wordlessly Herc brushes his finger along the back of her hand. Mako looks over at him but his eyes are resolutely ahead. Swallowing she turns her hand towards him. He presses something cool into her palm and withdraws his hand immediately. Mako knows exactly what the object in her hand is and finds herself profoundly grateful for Herc’s silence. 

That night alone in her room she slides the dog tag on the chain around her neck and only when the cool metal hits her skin does she allow herself to cry.


End file.
